Campgrounds need to offer this to lure in the record number of American campers

Think everyone is moving to the bustle of the big city? Think again! A new study by Kampgrounds of America (KOA), shows that more and more Americans are now spending their recreational time camping.

The report found that 61 percent of survey respondents answered that they had gone camping in 2014, a jump of 3 percent from 2013.

Early KOA estimates for 2016 are that 37 million households in the United States went camping at least once and almost a third indicated camping three or more times.

With the jump in camping households comes a new bread of camper. Millennials are the fastest growing group of campers with 51 percent surveyed indicate they plan to go camping more often in 2017. More importantly, millennials – and older campers as well – are changing the way they camp. A full 95 percent of people who go camping are bringing some sort of technology with them and 37 percent say access to technology is a requirement for them to be able to camp.

Almost half of respondents indicated that access to free Wi-Fi was an important consideration when choosing a campground. Campers who indicated access to technology allowed them to spend more time outdoors take on average two more vacation days to camp. That’s good news for campgrounds attracting visitors with free Wi-Fi and other amenities, and promising for camping enthusiasts.

So what do you think? Should more campgrounds offer Wi-Fi or is it a distraction from enjoying the outdoors?